A Virtual ‘Reading With Dogs’ session

A few of our volunteers are trying out virtual ‘Reading with Dogs’ sessions in schools as they are not able to physically visit due to Covid-19 restrictions. CCST volunteer Sharon Fergus, usually visits a secondary school in Glasgow weekly with either one of her registered Therapets, Skye or Harley. They attend the session individually with Sharon, never together. The virtual sessions are going very well and the pupils get to see Skye and Harley at home and both at the same time so it is interesting for them to see the dogs interacting. This school uses "Google Meet" for these virtual sessions and organises everything, sending the link to Sharon in advance.

At first the dogs took a while to settle down, but quickly learned what Sharon wanted them to do. The pupils read stories to Skye and Harley and then ask what the dogs have been doing and how they are getting along. This is a different RWD session to what we are all used to but the connection is still there with the pupils even although they cannot touch the dog as usual. This might not work with every school, but it very much works with the pupils in this school.

This is just one of the ways that we are trying to maintain a connection with our visiting partners during this pandemic and we are always thinking of new ways of doing so. If you're interested in taking part in a virtual session with a school, contact your Area Representative or the office about this.

Things you will need: laptop/computer/tablet/iPad/phone with camera and internet connection. The school will do the rest.

Enjoy and do let us know how it goes.